When you’re a big, for-profit project, it can be easy to justify a
change from outdated software to the new hotness: figure out why the
old software isn’t working for you, do a cost-benefit analysis, and –
if it still seems like a good idea – make the change.

When you’re a community of volunteers, that justification can be less
clear: cost-benefit analyses will rarely be about money. Worse still,
the human costs can be difficult to justify: It’s difficult to get
volunteers to do more unpaid work than they’re already doing. If your
community depends on Open Source software, you get the added political
difficulty of needing to navigate the divide between large-scale
change and making small improvements to systems your community
actively contributes to.

Whilst the motivation might be different, the process isn’t: leading a
community towards change means understanding why existing systems
aren’t suitable, making your community enthusiastic about the need for
change, and then actually making that change.

To help make this point more concretely, we’ll look at how and why
linux.conf.au – a long-running Open Source conference in Australia –
effected a move away away from a bespoke legacy conference management
software to one based on Symposion, the popular Django-based software
created for the Python Software Foundation. We’ll also look at how
that’s led to the PSF funding Registrasion, a Django-based conference
sales platform.

With this case study as a guide, we’ll talk about how to make a
decision to replace the software that your community runs on. In
particular, we’ll cover how to identify and engage with stakeholders
within a community; the value of prototypes in maintaining interest;
and what a cost-benefit analysis might look like when your currencies
are human joy, and burnout prevention.

Christopher is a programmer from Hobart, a city in Australia
surrounded by mountains and is only a ferry trip from Victoria. He’s
currently a freelancing Python developer, working on making conference
management better for people who manage conferences. He is strongly
interested in developing the Australian and International Python
communities: he is director of linux.conf.au 2017, a past convenor of
PyCon Australia, a past board member of Linux Australia, and has been
a fellow of the Python Software Foundation since 2013.

In his newly-found spare time, he enjoys presenting on Mobile
development at Open Source conferences, and presenting on Open Source
development at Mobile conferences.